


Fragments in Time

by Surajtare



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:22:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 18,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29826972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Surajtare/pseuds/Surajtare
Summary: "Nobody's down here but the FBI's most unwanted!" he called in response to her knock but did not turn around. Perhaps he was thinking "maybe if I'll ignore her she'll go away."She didn't.A peek inside Mulder and Scully's minds as they think about each other. From the Pilot to My Struggle IV: 26 stories, 25 years, two people who never talk about their feelings and one love story that's larger than life.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Comments: 20
Kudos: 61





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> These are stories that happen in and around episodes of the show. So, here and there I used actual dialogue from the show and, you know...it's not mine. However, I thought it would be tedious to mention every single sentence that I used, and every single writer by name. Long story short: if you recognize it, I didn't write it. Whoever wrote the episode did.
> 
> and other than that...I hope you enjoy diving into Mulder and Scully's minds with me! I've been writing this for a long time so, as usual, am a little nervous to let it out into the world.

The rumors started in early 1992, trickling down from the management offices on the fifth floor. They passed through human resources, down to accounting and on to the Violent Crimes Section. Finally, they reached a secluded space deep in the basement, where a lonely man was obsessively doing his lonely job.

And he _was_ lonely. He had no family to speak of, his sister missing and his parents distant and cold; Diana, his most significant relationship, gone from his life. He had no friends left outside of the bureau and hardly any in it. All he had was his job, and he threw himself into it with relish; hoping against all hope to find the answers to the mysteries of his life.

It didn't add to his popularity: the other agents thought he was a joke. They were taunting him in the hallways, whispering behind his back and he would speed past and ignore them. He was oblivious to the gossip, for the most part, mostly because he wasn't interested; but it found him anyway.

"Hey, Spooky," someone called out one day, "I hear they're looking for a partner for you."

"That's gonna take a while," his friend answered, sniggering, "who would agree to waste time on _that_ useless assignment?"

They walked past him, still laughing, while he pretended not to notice them. After they were gone he shook his head, wore his most seductive smile and went into Human Resources.

"Did you hear anything about that new partner business?" He asked his friend at HR.

"Oh, so the rumors are finally catching up with you, huh?" she asked teasingly. "And I thought you were one of the smart ones."

"Maybe I'm not," he said. "So, is it true?"

She nodded. "You're kind of late to the party. They already narrowed it down to a shortlist."

"How short?"

She smiled. "One name."

"Who?" he asked, bewildered.

"Have you ever heard of Dana Scully?"

*

_Dana Scully._

Mulder said the name aloud a few times, when he was alone. It had a sort of fluid feeling, rolling off the tongue. All his friend could tell him about her was that she was a teacher at Quantico. Never been assigned to the field.

_Just what I need_ , Mulder thought bitterly, _a rookie to babysit._

He asked around, discreetly, but nobody knew that much about her. She was the quiet sort, apparently, and mostly kept to herself. He didn’t ask anyone for a description as he had a clear picture of her in his mind: tall, slim, with dark hair and light eyes.

_My type, obviously_ ; _sent to spy on me, to put me on a leash_.

Over the next few days, Mulder set his investigative skills to find out whatever he could about this _Dana Scully_. Her credentials made him uneasy: undergraduate degree in physics, M.D., "Einstein's Twin Paradox: A New Interpretation."

In Mulder's head the people of the world were divided in two: word people and number people. Word people saw stories everywhere. Number people saw equations. Mulder was a word person through and through. He never trusted number people; they usually had an obsessive need to quantify everything. _Scully_ was definitely that kind, a person who could never understand the X files. The mere thought of a partner like that was exasperating.

Then, on March, he got a call from Reggie, his former ASAC at Violent Crimes.

"Just letting you know that your new partner will be joining you tomorrow, Mulder," Reggie said.

"Did someone put you up to this?" Mulder inquired.

"Just looking out for you, Mulder," Reggie said. "You've already pissed off enough people. Behave yourself, OK?"

"Of course I will," Mulder said, smiling into the phone, "Just like I always do."

Reggie sighed, exasperated. "I hope that poor girl knows what she's getting into."

Mulder doubted very much that this _Scully_ was a 'poor girl'. He did notice, while reading her file, that she got excellent scores at shooting _and_ physical training. Academically, she was top of her class. He wondered what _he_ was getting into, albeit involuntarily.

The next day Mulder was on edge, but he was not going to let _her_ see that. He sat around, pretending to work, with his back resolutely to the door. Even when he finally heard her, the click-clack of high heels on the basement floor, he did not budge.

"Nobody's down here but the FBI's most unwanted!" he called in response to her knock but did not turn around. Perhaps he was thinking "maybe if I'll ignore her she'll go away."

She didn't.

She wasn't what he was expecting at all. Her badge photo did not do her justice, he thought fleetingly. Short and pretty, she walked into the room without remarking on the ridiculous thing he had just said. Her smile was formidable but her eyes kind. At first he thought her hair was brown, but when she stepped forward he realized it was dark red. She didn't seem upset to be assigned to him; if anything, she looked curious.

So he gave her the whole drill about aliens and fantastic possibilities, hurling information at her, testing her. She rose to the challenge, eyes blazing – cocky, yes, but not condescending. It was strangely thrilling. Mulder was used to being the smartest person in the room, but here in front of him was his equal, giving him a piece of her mind. He couldn't help but smile, to his own surprise.

*

Mulder was not as discreet as he thought he was. Word that he was asking about her got to Dana pretty quickly. She was surprised, to say the least. She had heard about "Spooky Mulder", of course. He was a legend, of sorts. They spoke about him back at the academy, but by the time she graduated he was no longer working for the Behavioral Science Unit. He was down at Headquarters, in DC, and she was at Quantico, so she never actually met him.

Why would he be asking about her?

"Rumor has it they're considering you for his partner," Said Nancy Spiller, Chief forensics instructor at Quantico and Dana's boss.

Dana's eyebrows rose. "His partner? Where, at Violent Crimes?"

Nancy shook her head. "He's not at Violent Crimes anymore. I think he's down at the X-Files now."

"The X-Files?" Dana asked, confused.

"Cases dealing with unexplained phenomena," Nancy said. "It's quite out there from what I hear."

"Why me, though?" Dana asked.

Nancy shrugged. "Maybe they think you can ground him. _I_ certainly told them you can."

So before she was called to DC to be reassigned, Dana had time to consider. She was a little excited. She liked working at Quantico, but she did not join the FBI to teach. She wanted to solve crime, to help people. She wanted to be noticed, for once, for more than her skill with the scalpel.

From a young age she was drawn to science, to the clarity of numbers. In high school she was one of a handful of girls who took physics, in a classroom full of boys. In college it became worse and by the time she was in medical school she was used to it. She knew she was smart and she knew it didn't matter much: to get where she wanted to go she had to work twice as hard as the boys.

And even then it didn't always help; she was top of her class at the academy but was still assigned to a desk. She hated to admit it to herself, but her gender and her size were probably held against her. The FBI was very much an old boys club; they viewed her as _a_ _girl_ , helpless and a little silly, regardless of her performance. Even her students, on the first day of class, always looked surprised when she introduced herself as the teacher. She was too short, too young, and she made up for it with sculpted suits and a confident attitude.

She heard that Mulder was brilliant, an amazing profiler. Working with him was bound to be more interesting than teaching. And these X-Files, whatever they were, sounded like a challenge. Dana was not the type of woman to walk away from a challenge. By the time the official call came in that she was wanted in DC, she had already made up her mind.

Her new partner was shaping up to be more of a challenge than she anticipated, though. Cocky and somewhat defensive, he wasted no time throwing a pop quiz at her. She was relieved, in fact, that he took the conversation so fast in the direction of work. She always hated small-talk, and Mulder seemed just enough socially inept to avoid it altogether. He was asking her for her opinion. Crazy questions, but she was happy to answer. He just stood there, listening, smiling, his eyes warm. He was handsome, she noted fleetingly, information to be stashed away and ignored. When she went out of the office she was smiling and shaking her head.


	2. Silence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Set in the middle of the Pilot, between the mosquito bite scene and the Mulder backstory scene.

Rain was coming down in spades, enveloping them in a warm cocoon. Scully was seated at the small table, across from him. He wasn't even aware that he was gazing. She was a stranger but here she was, in his bedroom, half naked and shaking.

For the first time he noticed how small her hands were, folded quietly in her lap. She was absolutely tiny, but somehow he'd missed it until now. Her hair, wet from the rain, was a mass of dark waves. Her eyes, almost too large for her face, were tempered by her delicate roman nose. Her mouth was generous, pink lips over a pointed chin. Her facial features were all exaggerated, but somehow the combined effect was delicate. In fact, she was very pretty. Great body, too. He pushed these thoughts aside, violently. If she was to be his partner, than he shouldn't think about her that way.

 _She must be cold in that ridiculous robe_ , he thought, and yet said nothing.

They sat quietly for about ten minutes before she finally spoke.

"I'm sorry," she said.

"About what?"

"I…I really thought that…that…I guess I just panicked."

"I know," he said reassuringly. "Don't worry about it."

She looked up at him and saw only kindness.

"This is your first case, isn't it?" he asked.

She nodded.

"Well, on my first case I was chasing a serial killer who liked to mess with his victims for a long time before killing them. He would sneak into their homes, rearrange small things, move furniture and such. About halfway through the investigation I misplaced my favorite coffee cup and was sure he was targeting me."

She raised her eyebrows, surprised. "Was he?"

"No," he said with a chuckle, "it turns out my then girlfriend had broken it and was afraid to tell me. I walked around in fear for a week before she confessed."

Scully smiled.

"When I was in medical school it was not uncommon for someone to become sure they are suffering from some terrible disease. Everyone kept diagnosing themselves with deathly illness, in fact. It stopped after our professor told us it's a common phenomenon."

"Yeah, it's called 'Medical Students' Disease'," Mulder said. "They mentioned it when I was studying psychology. We had something similar, only with mental illness."

Now they both smiled at each other. The candle flickered in some invisible gust of wind, and Scully shivered.

"Are you cold?" he asked.

"A little bit," she admitted, pulling the thin bathrobe tight around her.

He got up, took a blanket off his bed and handed it to her.

"Here," he said.

"Thank you." She said, pulling it around her. She sat down on the bed, completely wrapped up in the big blanket, facing him. He fought the urge to smile.

"So, how do you like the X Files so far?" he asked her, a little teasingly.

"They're interesting. They _are_!" she added when he saw his skeptical look.

"Well, this is an interesting first case," Mulder said, sitting back in the chair and stretching his legs. He couldn't fight the smile anymore and she reciprocated, briefly.

"Do you really think aliens have something to do with all this?" she demanded, growing serious.

"I don't know," he admitted, "but I can't find any better explanation."

"We haven't found _any_ explanation, so far," she said.

"But you have to admit something is going on here," he stressed.

"Yes," she said, " _something_. I haven't figured out what, though."

He smiled. "That's why we're here."

They spent a few minutes in companionable silence.

"How did you end up in the X Files, anyway?" she asked after a while.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you…you were very successful at Violent Crimes, from what I heard. I just don't understand why you would drop a promising career for a fringe project like this."

"Maybe I think it's important," he said defiantly.

"Why?" she asked quietly.

"It doesn't matter."

She sighed, almost imperceptibly. Mulder got up and walked restlessly around the room. Scully watched him pacing back and forth. He was…confusing. There was something about him that called out to her, but she wasn't sure in what way. It wasn't a romantic way, she decided, even though he was attractive. She preferred older men, powerful and authoritative. Mulder wasn't any of those things. In fact, he had a very _boyish_ quality about him. People said he was crazy, but to her he just seemed…lost. Like a little boy. He was so different than other men she knew. She felt a strange urge to reassure him, to protect him, and filed it somewhere in her brain for later contemplation.

"It's…" he started after a while, "it's not just general interest, you know."

"What is?" she asked.

He sat down on the floor by the bed, his back to her. She lay down, half covered in the blanket, her head propped up on her hand.

"The X Files. I think they hold the answer to something that happened to me, that I was never fully able to explain."

"What?" she asked. Her voice was soft and gentle. It was dark and they spoke in hushed tones. He told her about Samantha and about how he found the X Files. She listened quietly, her eyes kind.

She was good with silence, it occurred to him. She was good at listening. From the little he'd seen she was good with words, too, just not overly eager to use them. Not your run-of-the-mill Number Person. Not your run-of-the-mill _anything_ : pretty but not vain; smart but not arrogant; skeptical but not close-minded. Nothing like he'd expected, really. She didn't fit comfortably with any of the pre-existing categories in his mind, so he made a new one for her right then. She was just _Scully_ , and the rest he'll figure out later.

When he told her about his mission and suspicions she just looked at him, as if trying to figure him out. He was trying to win her over to his side, even though he still suspected she might be a spy. His head told him she must be. His gut told him she wasn't. He decided to trust his gut; to trust _her_.

He couldn’t have known what she was thinking. She'd never, ever, tell him that. She'd never admit that she was charmed by him, even as early as then. She was impressed by his determination, by his _passion_ for his work. He actually wanted to solve this; not for the credit, not for a promotion, just…to _know_. To find out what was happening to these kids and to stop it, if he can. To find out what happened to his sister. It was inspiring. He was like no one she had ever met.

A loud ring shattered the comfortable silence and they both jumped. There was another unexplainable death, and they immediately snapped back to work mode. She jumped to her feet, rushing back to her room to get dressed. He pulled on a coat and his wet shoes. When they met by the car, five minutes later, it was like she'd never lain on his bed in her bathrobe, like he'd never poured his heart out to her.

 _This could work,_ he was thinking as he drove out into the night. He hazarded a look in her direction. Her eyes met his and held them briefly, and he knew she was thinking the same thing.


	3. Tomorrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scully thinking back on her first year with her partner, while trying to figure out a way to keep him in her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set directly after Mulder and Scully's phone conversation at the end of The Erlenmeyer Flask.

Scully lay wide awake, staring at the lines of light on the ceiling. She was listening to the sound of her breaths, in and out. She was trying to push the upsetting thoughts out, but they would not go away. Defeated, she sat up in bed, curling into a ball, head resting on her knees.

Back to the Academy. She did not want to go back there. To the monotonous classes, to the snarky students, to hours and hours of marking mediocre papers. This was so far away from her now. Comparing it to the last year she felt that she'd be bored out of her mind.

The X files were unlike anything else she had ever experienced. They were exciting, unexpected, dangerous even. She used her gun more in a week then most agents did in a year. She was faced with things she never thought possible and found herself fascinated. Career-wise this job was a dead-end but in other respects, it was addictive.

Mulder, too.

What was it about him, she wondered to herself as she lay alone in the dark. He was intelligent, more so than anybody she'd ever met. He was easy to talk to, for that reason. They could talk about anything, from predatory plants to space travel via wormholes, for hours on end. They once spent an entire afternoon discussing shamanistic mysticism. She learned new things from him every day. He was funny, which definitely helped with the day to day of their assignment. He was…unpredictable, running away from her and into trouble every chance he got. It was annoying, and somehow…well, exciting.

Well, okay, he was also handsome, but that wasn't why she liked him. She was surprised to discover, early on, that people assumed they were romantically involved. Mostly she found it amusing, but also exasperating. _Ridiculous_. It wasn't like that, between them. Not at all. It was just…they were _comfortable_ together, more so than they were with anybody else. She loved working with him. The truth was…the truth was she could only be herself around him.

It took her a while to notice this, of course. Maybe it was after her father passed away. She tried to put on her business face, her _I'm fine_ face. Mulder saw right through it, as always, but he didn't put much of a fight when she insisted on going straight back to work. At work she knew who she was. Working with Mulder, she knew who she was. He let her sort through her own affairs and he didn't baby her. It was refreshing.

Their interactions were freeing. With him she could let go of the social mask she had to wear with everyone else. With him she smiled because she wanted to, not because she was _expected_ to. There was no nonsense - just the puzzle, the work. No idle gossip for Mulder. He was profoundly uninterested in the private lives of others, unless aliens were somehow involved. He was so different than her other friends.

Not that she had that many friends, nowadays. They seemed to be disappearing lately. Everything was, actually. The longer she was around Mulder, the dimmer the rest of the world became. The more she was becoming herself around him, the harder it was to be around other people. They asked her about her vacation plans and urged her to date, talked about clothes and boys – things she was not interested in at all.

She also found her job very hard to explain. People didn't want to hear about a hundred-year-old-liver-eating-mutant. They did not understand the alien thing, either. She wasn't sure she understood it herself. She wouldn't believe it, only that she held an alien fetus in her hand two weeks ago.

 _Maybe it wasn't alien_ , she thought rebelliously. It definitely _looked_ alien, but she did not have the opportunity to study its genetics.

 _Ok_ , she told herself. _What about that Purity Control bacteria thing, then_? It had alien DNA, Dr. Carpenter told her that herself. She sat there, quietly listening to the scientist explain first year med-school genetics to her, because she was brought up to respect people. Dr. Carpenter was now dead, _murdered_ , for what she saw. The evidence, apparently alarming enough to kill for, lost.

But she had seen it with her own eyes. Wasn't that enough?

Startled, she sat up straight. _Jesus, I sound just like him_ , she thought.

She sighed. It didn't matter much now, did it?

She was going back to the academy. Back to being _Dana_. The worst part of it was that they would probably keep calling her _Mrs. Spooky_ behind her back for the rest of her career. She will teach and maybe share investigations with the likes of Tom Colton and the rest of the ambitious pricks. They will congratulate one another on their excellent work and bash other people behind their backs, like they did Mulder.

Again her thoughts circled back to Mulder. She was worried about him, about what would happen to him without her. Dr. Spiller was right, of course. She _did_ ground him, but not in the way the FBI expected. He grew more and more reliant on her, and she on him.

 _Tomorrow I will talk to_ _him_ , she decided. _I have to make sure he doesn't disappear on me. We'll keep being in each other's lives_.

She froze. What if Mulder didn't want her in his life? He sounded so bitter on the phone. After all, they were brought together by circumstance, and they rarely had any personal conversations. What would hold them together, now that she would no longer see him every day? She would be so lonely without him, she thought helplessly. She would be so damn _bored_.

She lay back down, staring at the ceiling again.

 _I'll talk to him about it tomorrow_ , she told herself as she drifted off to sleep.

 _Tomorrow_.

*

The next day was cold. Even the coat she was wearing wasn't enough to keep her from shivering, just a bit. The basement office was cold, too. It usually was, but more so today, their last day on the job. They were allowed only a short time to pack their things before they were to report to their respective new assignments. Scully was going back to Quantico, of course. Mulder would be reassigned as Skinner saw fit.

It wasn't only the chill of the office that made her shiver. Mulder was cold too. He barely looked at her as he packed things into a brown cardboard box: his name tag, a paper weight, a photograph of his sister. He was quick and methodical; like he imagined this day so many times that he was prepared for it.

Scully had little to pack. No name tag, no personal photos _._ She never really felt that this office was hers. It had been Mulder's since before she ever stepped in it, and she never truly made a space for herself here.

_Oh, well._

She didn't really come here to pack, anyway.

"Mulder", she said in a soft voice. He didn't respond.

" _Mulder_."

He raised his eyes to her. There was pain in them, and she resisted the urge to hug him. There was a time and a place for everything. Now was not the time. Here was not the place.

"I'll be coming up to headquarters once a week as part of my academy duties. We could grab lunch or – "

"We can't do that," He cut her off.

"Why not?"

"It's too dangerous."

"Come on."

"This isn't a joke, Scully. We came close lately, closer than we've ever come before. They'll be after us now, trying to stop us before it happens again. Your life could be in danger."

_Oh, Mulder._

"Don't be absurd."

He just gave her a harsh look and went back to his packing; which was just as well because he had an uncanny ability to read her. She didn't want him to notice how frantically she was searching for a way to keep him in her life.

"What if I find something interesting?" She hazarded eventually.

"What, you mean…"

"Some evidence, or…"

Her voice trailed off.

"You said you'll be up here once a week?" he said.

She nodded.

"Then…if you have something to tell me, something important, then lay this…" he took Samantha's picture momentarily out of the box, "face down."

"And then what?" she asked, trying not to sound overly worried or exasperated.

"Then we'll meet somewhere to discuss it," he said.

"Like where?"

"I don't know. Somewhere in the city, where we can meet in private. But not either of our apartments. A parking lot under a building somewhere, or…"

"What, like Watergate?" she asked, not able to mask the exasperation anymore.

He actually smiled.

"That's a great idea," he said. "The underground parking at the Watergate Hotel. Lowest floor."

"Mulder, that's…" she was going to say 'ridiculous' or 'crazy' but his face was so earnest that she gave up.

"Ok," she sighed.

He nodded, relieved. She took a step towards him, wondering whether it was time for that hug now. He took a step towards her. But they were both carrying cardboard boxes in their arms, so they ended up just staring into each other's eyes. Eventually Scully couldn't take it anymore, and closed hers.

"Dana, I…"

Her eyes flew open, but Mulder didn't say any more.

 _Dana,_ she thought helplessly, just like the first time he called her that, right after her father died.

"We'll stay in touch," she said, firmly now, and he nodded.

"Come on," he said, "we better get going before Skinner comes down here to chase us out with a broom."

She smiled and followed him out of the office.

"I'll see you around, Scully," he said as the elevator reached her stop at the lobby.

"I'll call you tomorrow," she replied and thought she caught his face break behind the closing doors.


	4. A Good Soldier

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Scully is returned from her abduction, Mulder tries to come to terms with her impending death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set during and immedietly after "One Breath".

Mulder was aware of the people around him talking, but their voices were muted by the uproar in his head. Scully lay in the bed, her face covered with so many tubes that she was hardly recognizable. The only clear thing he could see was a shock of red hair; the rest was a blur. The doctors and hospital security let him back in at the request of Mrs. Scully. He promised to behave himself, but the truth was all the fight had gone out of him once the reality of her condition began to sink in. She was gone, or going to be gone; he still felt her beside him, the tiny flame that was her, but it was fading away.

He hasn't been a whole man since she was taken; stumbling in the smoky hills of California with her cross around his neck. He wasn't praying, definitely not to Jesus or God; he just missed her. Holding on to this piece of her, the one thing she wore every day, made him feel closer to her somehow.

Now she was back, and he was still lost. It didn't help that people were all trying to make him move on, one way or another. Something in their words didn't quite sit well with him, but he wasn't sure what. He was in too much grief to make sense of it. Only later did he realize what was wrong: they used peculiar terms. They all described only a very specific side of her.

"She was a good soldier", X had said, and Skinner went further and called her "a fine officer". They both treated it like an ally in combat was about to die; a fellow troops man; a mere colleague. Their counseling went completely amiss of course: he never thought of her that way.

He thought of the small woman in a red bathrobe coming to his room on a stormy night and undressing, without the smallest implication of sex; the woman who barely reached his shoulder, even in heels; who found him at the edge of the world with the ease of a mind reader and got him out in one piece; who was a diehard skeptic but, nevertheless, always wore a cross around her neck.

She had a soft low voice that could break mountains. She had a sharp, serious attitude and yet her smiles lit up her whole face. She had a merciless sense of humor yet she was compassionate. Not many people noticed her enter a room but when she talked, everyone always listened. He was proud to be seen with her and felt lucky that she stood beside him.

Scully was unique. There was no moving on from her or replacing her. There was just her memory to carry for the rest of his life, the guilt over what involvement with him had cost her.

*

The doctor asked them into the room and talked about Scully's living will. Mulder had forgotten all about it. It was written months ago, a little after her father died; she had asked him to be her witness because he was already around. He agreed since he had nothing better to do and it was only a short elevator trip up to the Bureau's legal service. They were both so offhand about the whole thing. Little did they know that only a year later it will take on this new meaning: it's as if Scully was asking them to kill her.

On the first day he couldn't stay next to her for long. It was too much: the strong smell of antiseptic, the sound of the respirator, Scully's face covered with tapes and tubes. She was hanging on to life by a thread, but what worried him was that she might be cold. Her arms and legs were bare and the air was cool; but he said nothing. He was overwhelmed by her sudden appearance, by her strange sister and all those machines.

His heart was fluttering too much. He had to get out of there, away from the heartbreaking sight of his helpless, dying partner. Melissa was, alternately, a source of comfort and a nuisance. He smiled when she told him stories about young Dana and tried not to grimace when she babbled about energies. Mrs. Scully was mostly silent, sitting by her daughter and holding her hand.

Mulder needed to break something, to shoot someone, to do whatever it took to rip this terrible feeling out of his chest. It hurt, and it was all his fault. He wanted her around so he had never told her the risks. His selfishness was going to cost her life. He couldn't be in that room when they unplugged the respirator and nudged her a little further away.

Melissa showed up at his door, found him in the dark with a gun in his hand. Up until that point he'd thought that she wasn't like Scully at all. But the sisters had one thing in common: they both spoke their mind forcefully and unapologetically. Scully was dying, she said, and what he really needed to do was to go to her. Be with her. She was about to disappear forever, and here he was wasting precious time on revenge.

So he left, drove up to the hospital, used his badge to get access to her. It was after visiting hours and a peaceful hush rested over the hospital. At least it was quiet, now that the respirator was gone. At least he could see her face.

He held her hand in his. He had never done that before and was a little embarrassed to do it now; but he needed to touch her, to make sense of her presence here. Her hand was cold but he could feel the faint pulse under her skin.

He told her he thinks she should stay. He asked her to stay. He begged her to stay. Out loud he spoke of beliefs and strength and timing; inside all he could think was _please don't die please don't die please don't die_ – over and over and over again.

She must have heard him. Then again, maybe it was just in her nature to fight and to conquer. She was a good soldier, a fine officer, a fighter to her bones. She didn't die.

*

He came to visit her every day, now that she'd woken up. He usually sat only for a few minutes but he needed to be with her, to see with his own eyes that she was alive and well. They kept her in the hospital for a couple of weeks until she was deemed healthy enough to go home.

As for work, she asked to be reassigned to the X Files as soon as she heard they've been reopened. He didn't even have to persuade her. She seemed anxious to come back to work, which surprised him, considering everything that had happened. He asked her if she was sure. If, knowing the risks, she still wants to come back.

"Of course I do," she said. "The X files hold the answers to what's happened to me."

And so she returned. He looked at her enter the room and his heart welled up. To a stranger she would probably seem fragile and small, but he knew how strong she actually was. No, she wasn't going to leave again. Not this time.

She looked all wrong in this office: too neat for its chaos, too clean and pressed, but somehow she fit in perfectly. She looked around slowly, her sharp blue eyes not missing anything, searching for any changes. Eventually she nodded to herself, as if satisfied, and looked quizzically at him.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" She demanded.

"Like what?" He demanded right back. "I wasn't looking."

She gave him a _look_ , one of _those_ looks, and he fought the urge to smile. That look could freeze icebergs, but it was a warm breeze to him now. He had missed her so much that he went a little crazy. Than again, she always was the strong one.

 _Maybe they were right, in a way_ , he thought suddenly. _She_ is _a fine officer. And I would follow her to the end of the world if she'd want me to. And I'd run off to the edge of the earth unafraid of anything, because I know she will find me, wherever I go, and chase the shadows away until there's only light left._


	5. Exchange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scully tries to wrap her head around the fact that Mulder was willing to risk the most important thing in his life for her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set during "End Game".

It was his sister. _He replaced his sister for her_. She had no idea who this woman he was with might be. Mulder's expression was torn, but the woman next to him looked almost peaceful. She had light blue eyes, Scully could just make them out in the dark.

Who was she?

"Closer,” the man said, his voice deep and menacing. He held Scully tight, almost choking her. He was so strong, more than a man should be. He had held her to the ceiling with one arm, easily, had thrown her across the room like she was filled with straw. He'd looked like Mulder last night, even sounded like him, but then he…didn't.

The woman approached, as if entranced, and the man released Scully and gave her a push. She hurried away, past Mulder and into the car. Now the man had the strange woman in his arms, at his mercy. From the safety of the car, Scully could finally give her a good look. She had dark curly hair and fair skin. She looked familiar, in a vague sort of way, but Scully couldn't place her.

_Who was she?_

She could feel Mulder's anxiety even through the glass and metal separating them. _He's just worried_ , she told herself. _It's natural, he's putting this woman's life at risk._

And then the woman tried to attack the man, a gunfire was heard from somewhere and both woman and man fell into the river. Mulder ran to the ledge and called "Samantha! Samantha!"

Scully's heart stopped, and then started pounding very hard. Shock flowed from her spine to the tips of her fingers and toes. _That was his sister?! That was his sister!_ _Of course!_ She should have recognized her; she saw her picture every day. But the picture was of a child, as she was when Mulder last saw her. This was a woman, returned to him after all these years.

Scully's heart was in her throat. Mulder did not look at her and she did not go to him. He still stood on the bridge, looking down at the water. Scully stood next to the car, her eyes on him, not daring to approach him. An ambulance arrived and Skinner insisted she went on it.

"You need medical care,” he said and she didn't resist, but didn't reply either. She looked over her shoulder at Mulder all the way to the ambulance, but he did not turn around to look at her. At the hospital she did as she was told, answered questions as shortly as she could and insisted that she was fine.

"Take me back,” she asked Skinner. "I want to help find her."

Skinner shook his head. "You've been through a lot, Agent Scully. You need to rest."

She lowered her eyes so he would not see the look, but she thought he caught it anyway. He understood as well, everybody understood: Skinner, Mulder, her. Samantha understood something too, probably, or why else would she do it?

She came back to the bridge as soon as she could. Mulder was still there, staring out into the water. He still wouldn't look at her, but she could not blame him at this moment. She was vaguely aware of the ache in her body, the burning cut in her head. It didn't matter. She could manage. It was him she was worried about, and what the guilt would do to him.

When she asked him gently why he didn't tell her that it was Samantha, he said that he couldn't. He said that she'd never have let him do it, and her heart momentarily swelled. He still had his back to her, his face strained, fixed on the water.

 _Oh, Mulder_.

But then again, was it really her? Was he sure that it was her?

_Maybe he wasn't. Maybe that's why he agreed to the exchange. If this was his sister, the sister that he spent his entire life searching for, why would he exchange her for…me?_

He finally turned to her, turned _on_ her, furious that she would even consider such a thing. He was being defensive; _that_ she could handle. She was on familiar ground now: debating with him was easier than dealing with all this emotion, so she persisted until he left, not sparing her another look.

She stayed behind, taking over the search for him. He didn't ask her to, but of course she did. She pulled his sister's body from the water and watched it melt into an unrecognizable mess. It wasn't Samantha after all, but did that really matter? He would risk his sister's life for hers. He _did_ risk his sister's life for hers. He saved her life. Now she had to save his.

He disappeared, ditched her again. Last time he did that he left a breadcrumb trail for her to follow. This time he left her a short "don't follow me" note that scared the life out of her. She knew, when she came back from her abduction, that he would feel the need to protect her now. She knew he felt responsible for everything; and she knew it was no use telling him that she wanted to be there, chose to stand by him every single day.

She had to find him. She had to save him. He drew the line for her but didn't take her persistence into account. She wasn't even mad; she just had to find him.

"These are the risks we take,” he’d told her only three days earlier. "Either you take them, or you don't."

 _Liar_ , she thought to herself on the plane to Alaska, on her way to him. _You wouldn't take that risk and neither would I. I will find you and I will save you, even if it kills me. You'd expect no less of me, anyway._


	6. The Power of Suggestion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mulder's thoughts after narrowly avoiding shooting Scully.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Set immediately after the events of "Pusher".

Scully's fingers searched his, struggling to hold him for a second. When they made contact, she wrapped her whole hand around two of his fingers, apparently not able to fit in any more.

 _She's so small_ , he thought, just for a second, before squeezing back.

"Let's go," she said, and walked out the door. It hurt when she let go of him.

After a moment he followed her, focusing on her red hair bouncing as she walked, surefooted, through the hospital hallways. He followed the click-clack of her heels and remembered hearing it for first time, just before they met. That sound was annoying to him then, filled with uncertainty. Now it dictated the rhythm of his heart. Scully was steady, he was not. Scully was stable and she was safe. Scully would not leave him and she would do anything to save his life, including shooting him.

Hell, she _did_.

Modell got it all wrong, of course. He could not understand the concept of shooting someone to save their life. Nobody could, really, but it made sense to Mulder in a way that few things did. Scully did amazing things when she needed too, including physically carrying the unconscious him to a car; He never figured out just how she had managed to do it. He wasn't even embarrassed that she did.

He was, however, a little ashamed about today. How he so easily fell prey to Modell's taunting. How he pointed the gun at her and she got that hurt, incredulous look in her eyes. Modell was going on and on about how only the warrior who isn't afraid of death can win a fight; but he got that wrong, too.

Mulder wasn't afraid of his own death, he was willing to die if that's what it took. No, the thing he feared the most was _Scully's_ death. That's why he could hold off, fight the overwhelming power of suggestion long enough for her to save them. His fear of Scully's death won them the fight, and Modell could never have guessed that.

Mulder knew that there was gossip about Scully and him in the FBI hallways. There were bets going on, he was sure of it, though nobody said anything directly. One good thing that happened since he was paired with Scully was that no one called him names anymore. Maybe it was because they respected Scully. Maybe they were afraid of her. Either way, with her by his side, nobody bullied him.

The rumors did not trickle all the way down anymore, regardless of what people thought was going on. People were trying to figure them out, and they ignored it. It was easy to, down in the basement, with nobody but each other. Scully would sit across from him at his desk, her head bent over some files. He would crack sunflower seeds and hand her a pencil or an eraser or whatever it was she was waving for. She didn't even have to ask, and he didn't even have to raise his head.

What was it between him and Scully?

He didn't know. She probably didn't either. She was his friend, of that he was sure. She was important to him, probably more important than anyone else in his life. It went unsaid, but he imagined she knew. He _hoped_ she knew, though she never inquired about his feelings.

It was probably for the best.

He followed her to his car and put the keys in her outstretched hand.

"Come on, Mulder,” she said. "I'll take you home."

They drove to his apartment in silence, Scully fumbling with the radio in a vain attempt to find decent music.

"What is wrong with the world these days?" She asked absentmindedly, giving up and turning off the radio.

He shook his head.

When they arrived at his building he asked her if she wanted to take his car home.

"You can return it tomorrow,” he suggested.

She gave him the longest look and said "actually, I was thinking I'd go up with you, if that's okay. I don't think you should be left alone."

"Why, you think I'd hurt myself?" He asked, a short exasperated laughter escaping his lips.

She shook her head impatiently. "No. No, of course not. That's not what I meant."

"Then what _did_ you mean?" He asked, confused.

"I just want to be there for you, okay?" she said as if admitting it was excruciating. "I…you've been through a lot today."

"So have you,” he pointed out and she shook her head, not looking at him.

He sighed and gave in.

They walked to his apartment in silence and she ordered food, tidied up after they ate and even turned the TV on for him. He took his pillow and stretched to his full length on the couch, closing his eyes. He didn't realize how exhausted he was. He could feel Scully's eyes on him, searching his face.

"Well, I guess I should get going,” she said finally.

"No, stay,” he said quickly. "Please."

There was a pause. He opened his eyes and saw her in the same spot, looking down at him.

"Okay,” she said finally, gracefully folding her legs under her into a cross-legged position. He wondered if she took ballet as a child, and then thought better of it. There's no way she did. Little Dana was more likely to take Karate. He'll have to ask her sometime.

"What are you smiling about?" She asked from somewhere around his neck. She sounded tired, but pleased.

He shook his head, still smiling. She didn't press. She rested her head against the couch in the vicinity of his chest. He thought that maybe he could feel her hair, soft against his t-shirt, but he was too tired to open his eyes and see. _Why does she always smell so good_? He thought before he fell asleep.

He woke up with a start in the middle of the night. For a moment he was afraid that he was alone, but no - - Scully was still sitting there, leaning on the couch, fast asleep. She was absolutely beautiful in the moonlight, and he felt himself blush. He still shouldn't be thinking about her that way. He really tried not to. As if feeling his gaze, she stirred and woke up. She turned her face to him and smiled.

"Hey,” she said.

"Are you comfortable down there, Scully?" He asked. "Do you want to take the couch?"

She smiled. "I'm fine," she said, and held her hand up.

He took it, entwined his fingers with hers.

"Do you think I would have done it?" He asked sleepily. "Shot you?"

"No," she said, not hesitating. "You didn't shoot me, Mulder. You fought it."

She fell silent, and for a while he thought she was asleep again.

"How?" she asked suddenly. "How did you do it?"

He never answered. Eventually they fell asleep, his hand still in hers.


	7. Mind Control

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As she is running for her life, Scully doubts everything she thinks she knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story takes place during "Wetwired". Scully went a little crazy in that episode, so this chapter is a little crazy as well.

Mulder is going to kill her he's going to kill her he's going to kill her. He's one of them. He can't be trusted. Why did she trust him? He's going to kill her. He's one of them. The smoking man…he's in on it. It was all a lie. She exposed herself to him. She let herself be vulnerable. She should never have let her guard down, why did she ever come to him in the first place? He took her trust and he used her.

She's running now, barefoot, gun in hand. It's cold, but she hardly notices. She's running for her life. Away, away. From the lies, from the deceit, from the trauma of her abduction. She never let herself feel it, did she? She lost weeks of her life and she ignores it like it didn't happen. She was violated, she was raped, she knows she was, she can feel it. Her period was never the same afterwards and she figured it was the stress but that's because she wouldn't let herself think of the possibilities. There was a metal chip in her neck. They tagged her like you do a dog, so that any vet could find her if she was ever lost. Well, too bad for them because she took the damn thing out and now she _is_ lost, running, running for her life.

Mulder is one of them. He gave her _Superstars of the Superball_. He held her hand when she was dying. It was all a lie! He's one of them. He gave her away to those _men_ , all the while sweet-talking her mother into trusting him. Like he sweet-talked her. And here she was, stupid, stupid Dana, blind to what was right in front of her. She saw him with the smoking man, his face alight in a friendly smile, he was laughing – at her, she was sure. At her naiveté. At her blind trust.

"Yeah, I got her,” she imagined he said. "She doesn't suspect a thing."

Her lungs are about to burst. The air is cold and she is cold and her stockings are torn, abraded by the rough sidewalk. Her feet are sore and full of blisters. Now that she stopped running she is suddenly cold. She looks around, but nothing seems real. Everything is distorted. Like the world, it's upside down and inside out and Mulder betrayed her all these years.

Where is she going? Where should she go?

 _Mom_ , she thinks, stopping on her tracks. _I'll go to mom's. Mom will protect me._

She takes a look around, trying to figure out where she is.

"Hey!" Someone calls in the distance. "Hey, lady!"

Startled, she starts running again. She doesn't stop until she stumbles on the stairs of her mother's house, breathless and sore.

"Dana?" Her mother opens the door to her frantic knocking. "Dana! I was so worried!"

She tries to hold her but Scully is way too wired for that, she just nudges her mother aside and rushes into the house. Franticly, with barely controlled motions, she moves from window to window, closing the blinds.

"Dana, what's wrong?" Her mother asks, a little frightened now. She doesn't answer, keeps closing the blinds window after window. "Fox called me, he was worried, said you took off. I…I should call him to say you're alrigh - -"

"NO!" Scully calls, startled. "No. Don't call him. He can’t know that I'm here."

"Why not?" Maggie asks, anxious. "What's the matter?"

"He's going to kill me," Dana says. "I'm hiding. Hide me. You can't trust him. He'll kill me."

Maggie stands there, dumbfounded. "Dana, that's not true. I know Fox, he'll never hurt you…"

"YOU DON'T KNOW HIM! YOU KNOW NOTHING!" she yells, and then, startled at her carelessness, drops her voice to a whisper. "Mom, I've seen him do things I cannot explain. All I can tell you is that he cannot be trusted. Don't tell him I'm here, don't answer the phone, don't let anyone suspect that you know where I am."

"But Dana…"

"My life is in real danger, do you understand? Help me!"

Maggie gives her a long, appraising look. Finally she straightens her back, as if steeling herself, and says "Ok, alright. I won't tell a soul. Now come, I'll make you something to eat. Come on."

"I'm not hungry."

"It's okay." Maggie says, finally pulling her daughter into her arms. "Shhh. You're okay. You're safe."

*

Mulder arrived a few hours later, banging on the door like a hurricane and demanding to be let inside. Scully hid away, her heart pounding, nearly paralyzed with fear. Later, when she was herself again, she realized that he was never afraid. She pointed her gun at him and her mother got scared, but Mulder didn't. She was terrified, but even through the fear she could sense the calm in his voice, that deep familiar _something_ that was always there.

"You never trusted me!" she yelled at him and that was what hurt her the most, the thought that he never really opened up to her, that he played her to his own ends, that he only faked letting her in on his soul. He said the opposite, he insisted that he trusted _only_ her, and her mother stood between him and the gun.

Would she have shot him?

That TV mind control device made people live their worst fears, Mulder said. Her worst fear was Mulder betraying her. It made sense. In this strange little universe she shared with Mulder trust was the only hard currency. It was hard to come by and it was cherished. She was so afraid that he had stolen hers.

But she didn't shoot him, in the end, and not just because her mother was in the way. Even in her crazed confusion she clung to a glimmer of hope: that he was telling the truth, that the trust between them was real. It went unsaid, like so many other things between them, but she hoped he knew anyway.


	8. Lemonade

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mulder has a stunning realization.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one takes place during "Home". Don't worry, though, I avoid the blood and guts. Also it's has some mature content.

It took him four years before he first saw her as a mother, but when he did, the image just wouldn't leave his mind. In all the time he had spent with her he saw her as a spy and as an ally, as a friend and as a protector, as a savior and as an anchor - - but never as a mother.

She visited his dreams as a lover before; it usually made him wake up with a start, his cheeks burning with embarrassment and guilt. He tried to avoid fantasizing about her, when conscious. When masturbating he tried to think about girls like the ones he used to be attracted to: tall, brunette, endless legs; but when he came, right in the middle of orgasm, Scully's face always flashed before him, eyes closed and lips parted with passion. He felt guilty, but he had no control over it. In his dreams, she was a lover; in his waking hours, a friend; but he never saw her as a mother before.

She was just a tiny little thing but she had steady hands and a soft voice, an impossible combination of softness and steel. Once he saw her in his mind's eye lulling a baby to sleep, the image would not go away. Not Scully in formal suits and a gun in her hand, but Dana in an old t-shirt and hand-paint on her small palms. Her eyes narrow as she laughs, actually laughs, not the smirks or chuckles that she settles for usually.

When the subject came up (she brought it up, the first time that he realized she sees herself as a one-day-mother) he couldn't let it out of his mind. They sat on a bench in front of the police station, after examining the most deformed infant either of them will ever see. His eyes were still getting used to the bright light outside, after the darkness of the police station's washroom.

The sunlight, almost merciless, lit her hair a fiery red. He could see every freckle on her delicate face, and it made her look young and a little vulnerable. Naturally, the conversation turned to genetic abnormalities. She said that her family had no history of them and, trying to reassure her, he patted her back. _Just find someone with good genes and have some babies_ , he said, only half joking. She gave him a look and casually asked about _his_ genetic history.

He wondered if the double meaning was in her question or in his head, and her smile was no answer to his inquiring gaze. Were they flirting during a case involving inbreeding and infanticide? Well, maybe they were. Scully wanted a family? Well, maybe she did. He'd never suspected it since, as far as he knew, she never even went out on dates.

His heart quickened, excited at the sudden image of her, barefoot on a Saturday morning, chasing around a few kids in the back yard. Of course they were his, he was there trying to teach everyone baseball while she went in for some lemonade. That was the scary part, scarier than any mutant: it was the first time he realized that he wanted her to have his children.

It was the first time it even occurred to him that _he_ might want children someday. He didn't, really, or at least didn't give it any thought, until now. Maybe he just never found the right woman, or the right time. Maybe, given his family history, the concept of carrying on that misery was…unpleasant.

But it hadn't all been miserable, had it? His parents were never very loving towards one another, as far as he could remember. Not that he remembered much of them from the pre-abduction days. There weren't many kids his age in Chilmark so he spent a lot of his time with Samantha. It didn't matter that she was younger than him, and a girl. They would play together and tease each other and whine and even fight, but they also played together. Samantha was the only member of his family to spend any time with him and then she was gone and he was all alone.

 _Scully's childhood must have been so different_ , he thought to himself. He knew it on some level, since she'd mention it from time to time. She had a big family, loving parents who encouraged her to do the best with her abilities, siblings who looked out for her. Unlike him, she knew what a happy family was like, so maybe it was natural that she would want one of her own.

He'd been thinking about that all day, so when she went to sleep he told her "goodnight, _mom_ ", and she gave him a half exasperated, half amused glare. He had no idea what she was thinking; Scully could be very hard to read, sometimes. Her head was probably somewhere else, anyway.

She was much more shaken by this case then he was, which wasn't unusual. Their sensibilities were different; well, almost _everything_ about them was. He kind of liked it, and he suspected she did, too. Either way, she'd become such a big part of his life that he couldn't imagine them without her. 

He wondered if she understood that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her; that he wanted _everything_ with her: lover, mother, doctor, partner, scientist, ally, friend. He wanted everything that Scully was and could be, all for himself.

The problem was, he didn't know where she stood on this. Did she want it all with him? She never said anything nor gave him any indication. Her talent for silence was frustrating, sometimes. Then again, her eyes always let on so much more than her words did. On the way back home, in the car, he breathed deeply and smiled at her when she wasn't looking. They had time, for now. He could wait.


	9. My Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scully is scared, frustrated and confused.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one takes place right after "Never Again" and is from Scully's perspective, so it's kind of a whiplash from the previous chapter.

"Not everything is about you." She told him. "This is my life."

"Yes, but it's m-" He said, stopping himself just in time. She gave him a look, daring him to complete the sentence. What, "Mine too"? "My problem"? "Me you're mad at"?

He didn't say more. It was probably for the best. They sat in silence for a while; a bad, loaded silence. Eventually he just got up and left without a word. She didn't bother to raise her head. She was looking at the dried rose petal, turning it to and fro between her fingers, and thinking about him.

They were entangled in a way that hurt. It seemed to her, as she sat alone in his… _their_ office, next to their… _his_ desk, that she wasn't sure anymore which part of her was her and which was him. The process of unification was so gradual she was not sure exactly when it passed the point of no return, but now she felt…suffocated. Lost. She didn't know who she was anymore.

It had its rewards. Mulder could be very sweet sometimes, and she still loved his crazy theories and his sense of humor. She loved how he respected her opinions, her silence and her autonomy…except when he didn’t. He could also be obnoxious, self-centered, blind to her, infuriating. Four years in and she still felt like she wasn't noticed. People still referred to the X-Files as Mulder's obsession, to her as…as a footnote in his story. Sometimes he would do it himself. Sometimes _she_ would. She felt that if she died now she'd have nothing to show for it but a deep devotion to a man with a cause she didn't even believe in.

 _Don’t think about dying,_ she told herself firmly. _You’re not going to die. What Leonard Betts told you has nothing to do with this. It’s your life you’re worried about, not your death. Do you like your life?_

 _Well_ …she still loved the work. She loved the banter with Mulder, the perpetual sense of discovery – although lately that was fading away. Mulder…she had to admit to herself that Mulder _did_ notice her, at least those parts of her she longed to be noticed. He respected her for her intellect and he… _needed_ her, desperately so. She needed him, too, and it made her uneasy, because they weren't lovers and she knew that he and this job were standing in the way of love.

Her thoughts drifted back to Ed. Ed was…well, he seemed to notice her in a way that Mulder didn't, that nobody did for a long time. Ed saw her as a woman. An attractive, interesting woman. He was handsome. He was _there_. She was going to be gone the next day anyway. She was young and single and why the hell not?

She tried to shake off the feeling that she was being punished for it. She wasn't a whiner. But was it so hard for her to enjoy a night of abandon without being beaten half to death the next day? The signs were there, with Ed, red flags everywhere. She ignored them, and she had to ask herself why. Was she that desperate for attention? She shoved the thought out of her mind.

Mulder was being insufferable. It was almost as if he was punishing her…no, he _was_ punishing her for it. He was mad at her, and for the life of her she didn't want to know why. She _knew_ why. They were each other's substitutes for love; they were each other's significant other in every way that was significant…except the only way that really was.

Mulder needed her, sometimes for a friend and sometimes for a mother, sometimes as a partner and sometimes as a surface to bounce his ideas against. It was heartwarming and exhausting, invigorating and intense.

She needed him, too, even though she hated to admit it. She reached out to him the minute things started to go wrong with Ed. She knew he would be expecting her call, and at that moment she hated herself and him and their twisted situation. He could expect all he wanted, for all she cared. He wasn't her father and he wasn't her boyfriend. She owed him no explanation.

When did he become this…this figure to please? When she joined the X-Files? When they were separated? No, she thought she could trace it back to her abduction. She woke up in a strange hospital bed, blinking in the cold neon light, and the last thing she could remember was Duane Barry hauling her out of the trunk of her car. It upset her not because she didn't know what was done to her but because she knew Mulder would want to know. Mulder was obsessed with abductions his entire life and here she was, the best eye witness he could possibly hope for…and she remembered nothing. She actually apologized to him, in a way, when he first came to visit her after she woke up.

He shook his head and said "It doesn't matter" and she relaxed, because she realized that it really didn't. Sometimes they were very much in tune. He left after a few minutes, taking that burden with him.

"Fox has been so worried about you," her mother had said, and she remembered asking herself, _when did my mother start calling him Fox? When did my mother meet him, period?_ They never told her the circumstances of their first encounter and she never asked. She could imagine how it was, anyway.

Right after that she returned to work. Skinner came to visit her one day at the hospital, out of the blue. She was embarrassed but also strangely gratified that he cared. He told her that the X-Files had been re-opened and she said "I want to go back."

"I know,” he said. "I'll take care of it. You rest."

So she came back to work even before she was feeling well enough. She wanted to be there, for herself and for Mulder. She did not want to show weakness, did not want him to think he had to take care of her now. He did anyway, and that made her pleased and embarrassed and warm and mad, all at once. She pushed all that turmoil aside and concentrated on the work.

She could only be herself around Mulder, but she _couldn't_ be herself around Mulder. The world outside of the office was dull but it still existed, and it had things in it that the basement did not. It had sunlight, quiet afternoons with friends, laughter and uncomplicated conversations. Scully still hated small-talk, but she was growing weary of confronting the evil of the world. Worse: since she had no friends anymore, she had no one to talk to about anything that _wasn't_ the evil of the world. She had no one to talk to about herself; except for Mulder, and he didn't want to see her weakness and her insecurities.

He was so afraid that she will find someone other than him to spend time with, confide in. She was enraged at the hurt in his eyes when she told him that her life was standing still. She didn't want to think where that hurt came from. Mulder's feelings cannot be her problem, she thought to herself. So she rebelled, not so much against him as against herself, her insecurities and this strange and all-consuming relationship that had all the ingredients of a union of souls without the actual union.

For a while she kept her distance from him. She needed it. It gave her time to process the last few weeks. It gave her time to consider what Leonard Betts had told her. She'd been trying not to think about it, she was terrified and angry, and the fear of death made her life look meaningless. Mulder respected her silence, as he always had. She finally had time to think.

After a few days she started to feel better. The commotion in her head subsided, at least for now. Mulder was more careful with her, more respectful. He seemed to be considering the risks of treating her the way he had and not willing to take them. He asked for her opinion more often and he so desperately tried to make her smile. She did. She'd missed him, she realized with surprise. He was a boy, a charming and lost and exasperating boy. She could breathe again.

When she was diagnosed with cancer she only called him. For all his faults, Mulder was the only one she could tell right now. She trusted him to make sense of it for her before she revealed it to anybody else. Faced with the grim odds of survival, she felt there was no point in hope. She was trying to wrap her head around impending death…but Mulder wouldn't. Under the layer of cynicism was an incurable optimist. That's why she needed him in her life. His relentlessness, his stubbornness…he wouldn't give up on her and so she drew strength from his conviction, as always.

She also started to write a journal for him to read after she'll be gone. It began as an impulse and continued with a new awareness: she cared about him much more deeply than she ever realized. Her diagnosis brought everything into new, cruel focus: she hated to have to leave him. She hated the thought of the years he'd have to spend without her. He will be lost without her, so she has to leave something behind for him.

When he came to the hospital he brought flowers. He made a stupid joke about stealing them but she knew that he had gone and picked them out himself. He was being sweet again, and so she took them with a smile and for that tiny moment, all was well again.


	10. The Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Scully's cancer goes into remission, Mulder looks back at the last few months.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one takes place right after "Redux", as Mulder is sitting on the bench outside of Scully's hospital room and everybody else is inside.

As he was sitting outside Scully's hospital room, Mulder thought back on the last few months: when Scully got sick, she only called him. The sicker she got, the closer they became. She let herself rely on him; she wrote him a journal. He only read a few lines before she threw the thing away but that's all it took. He knew now that he meant more to her than he ever suspected. She stood by him even when it was hard for her, mentally and physically. She was there for him and he was there for her, when she allowed him to.

She would open up to him, if he ever dared challenge her; he always suspected as much, but now he knew. Not that he tried: unfortunately he owed the knowledge to Eddie Van Blundht. His thoughts turned to the night he crashed into Scully's apartment to find her on the verge of kissing Eddie, or rather, himself. They didn't talk about it. Scully just passed a frightened look from him to Eddie and drunkenly stumbled into her bedroom, slamming the door. Mulder apprehended Eddie and called the police to come pick him up. After he was finally gone Mulder knocked on Scully's bedroom door and opened it slightly, only to find her fast asleep in her clothes. The next day she met him at work with a terrible headache and very dim memories of the night before. He never asked her what exactly happened and she never volunteered.

She kept getting sicker after that. She didn't tell him, but he knew. Just like he knew that she loved him when he read half a page of her journal. There was a thing between them that didn't need saying, that words just interfered with. Or maybe that's just what he was telling himself.

Her disease distressed him in more ways than one: he knew it was _given_ to her, and he knew by whom. All of this was his fault, everything she's been through; for some reason they've been punishing him through her, she was made to suffer to teach him a lesson.

He suspected the smoking man was behind this, too. He probably thinks he's protecting him. Mulder didn't want to think about it. He was fairly sure now that this man was his father, at least biologically; it made sense, in its own twisted way. He gave him a promise of a cure for Scully and he gave him a glimpse at his sister. He wanted Mulder to join him in his world of darkness; if it weren't for Scully, he probably would have accepted.

He came to Scully's hospital room at night to say goodbye. He wanted to wake her up and apologize for leaving her, to promise her that it's for the best. He wanted to leave her to save her life, to save himself. To go to a world where Samantha was alive and well, where all the secrets would be revealed to him, where he could watch from the sidelines as Scully got better; where he could make sure she never came in harm's way again.

But in that room, seeing how sick she looked, he just couldn't. She was so tired that she didn't wake up, not even when he held her hand and cried silently. She was breathing, but her breaths were raspy and shallow. Her skin was colorless but her lips were soft and pink, curling slightly at the corners, as they were when she was peaceful.

She would never be his lover, or the mother of his children; she would never be the mother of any children, he suspected, even if she pulled through this. He didn't even tell her that, even though she had the right to know. But how could he tell her, on top of all this, that her chance of motherhood was stolen from her? How could he tell her that when she was dying? So he didn't tell her, and the months went by, and it became harder and harder. Maybe he was a coward, after all.

Of course he was, only daring to touch Scully when she was about to die. And he did, as much as he could, now: kissing her cheek and holding her hand in the hospital. She accepted it naturally, as always. It broke his heart.

The next day, after the hearing, he came back to the hospital. He wanted to be with her until the end, to hold on as much as he could before she would disappear into the dark. But she had a surprise for him: her tumor diminished visibly overnight, cancer cells disappeared from the bloodstream. She was getting better, at incredible speed.

"You saved my life," she told him quietly, her small hand clasped in his and he said "you don't know that. It could've been the prayers."

She smiled at that, and said nothing. He would have to tell her about his sister, eventually. He would have to tell her about her ova. But not just yet, not just yet. For now he just wanted to hold her hand, move the hair from her forehead and listen to her talk. She would come back to work as soon as she can, she promised.

But as she got better, he was pushed to the sidelines again. Now her family was gathered around her to celebrate, even her priest, and he didn't find his place in the room. The truth was he did not belong in Scully's life. Even _she_ didn't belong in that life, at least not the part of her she shared with him. That was theirs alone; it did not have a place in a room full of people. When she got sick it was just the two of them; when she got better it was everyone but him.

He must have dozed off on that bench, because Mrs. Scully woke him up at about midnight.

"It's late, Fox," she said softly, "why don't you go home to sleep?"

Mulder blinked at her, confused. Bill Jr. was by her side, radiating silent contempt.

"How's Scully?" Mulder asked, ignoring him.

"She's asleep," Mrs. Scully said, "We're going home for the night."

"I…I think I'll stay a while longer," Mulder said, immediately hit with an intense wave of dislike from Bill.

Mrs. Scully smiled. "Okay," she said. "Good night, Fox."

After they left Mulder walked silently into Scully's room. She lay in bed, awake, waiting for him. When he reached her side she held her hand out and he took it, grateful.

"Are they gone?" Scully asked.

He nodded.

"I pretended to fall asleep," she said.

"Why?" he asked, perplexed.

She shrugged. "Where have you been?"

"Just outside," he said, "I didn't want to intrude."

"Don't be absurd."

"Your brother doesn't like me," Mulder said.

Scully gave a hollow laughter and entwined her fingers with his. "When I was growing up my father was gone a lot, so Bill took over as the man of the house. He's always been very protective of us, especially Mellissa and Me. He hated every man that ever stepped near one of us. We used to sneak behind his back all the time."

"But…" Mulder said. "We're not…"

"I know," she cut in immediately. "Even if we were, it would have been none of his business."

Mulder nodded slowly. Scully's eyes broke away from his and unto their entwined fingers.

"Listen, Mulder, I…I wanted to thank you."

He was taken aback. "For what?"

"For standing by me. For being there for me these past few months. Your support meant a lot to me."

It was his turn at a hollow laughter. "What support? I don't feel like I was there for you at all. Most of the time I pretended like nothing was wrong."

"That's exactly what I needed," she said quietly, looking back into his eyes. "You kept me fighting. You made me feel normal. Working with you…it's important to me, Mulder."

He held on to her hand until she fell asleep and stayed there, by her side, until just before dawn.


	11. Cracks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scully deals with grief, anger and her family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so this is another sad one. I'm sorry...it's just that seasons 4 and 5 were so harsh on Scully. So many hard and sad things happened to her, and this one is in the aftermath of "Emily" which was so, so sad. I swear it gets better down the line.

Rain was falling in thick curtains from the heavens, blurring everything into a heavy grey smudge. It was like the sky remembered this was the middle of winter, and was trying to compensate for all the clear and sunny days they had throughout the last two weeks. Scully sat in the car, staring outside, motionless. She felt, not for the first time, like even the slightest movement will cause her to break. She felt like an old china doll, worn and cracked, cold on the outside and hollow on the inside.

She still hadn't fastened the gold cross back around her neck. It lay in her palm, warm and innocent, unaware of all the weight it was carrying. Such a simple object, holding within it all this love and longing and pain and loss. She could feel Mulder's eyes veering to her every now and then, but did not turn to look at him.

Mulder must have thought he was being chivalrous, keeping things from her that were hers to know. He said he was trying to protect her. She wasn't angry at him, exactly, because by now she understood him so well; but that made her angry at herself. She _should_ be angry at him, she knew. He was way out of line. She felt betrayed; that the trust between them was cracked.

She would have to get an explanation out of him, if she can ever get herself to talk to him about it. She thought about it constantly ever since the hearing, ever since she heard him explain calmly to the judge just why she couldn't have children, something which he never told _her_.

 _What else does he know?_ she wondered. He came back from the nursing home quiet and subdued, and said nothing. He was hiding something again, after all of this.

He tried to be there for her, she guessed, in his own way. Running around and shouting at the moon, waving his gun, threatening people. She had no interest in such things. She, for a while at least, had a child to take care of; Emily was more important than the reasons for her existence. She was there and needed help, so the big questions had to wait.

"We're here," Mulder said, and she realized the car had stopped. They were parked in front of Bill's house, masked by the heavy rain. Finally she forced herself to turn her head and look at him.

"Thank you for driving me," she said.

He nodded, once. His jaw was clenched and his knuckles were white against the steering wheel. She would ask what was wrong but she just couldn't, she had no energy left for his problems as well. Mulder will have to take care of himself, for once. She was barely holding on as it was.

"I'll see you tomorrow at the airport, okay?" she added, after a thought.

"I'll come pick you up," he offered, "if that's okay."

She tried to smile and it came out morbid. "Yes, thank you."

He nodded again and waited for her to step out of the car. She climbed out into the rain, not bothering with her umbrella, not looking as he drove away.

Inside the house it was nice and warm. Fire was crackling in the fireplace, Maggie and Tara seated in front of it. Tara had baby Mathew in her arms and they were cooing over him. They stopped when they noticed Scully, looking guilty.

"It's okay," she hurried to assure them, "I'm okay."

Maggie nodded, but Tara still looked guilty.

"He's a lovely baby," Scully continued. "I'm very happy for you, Tara. I am."

"I know you are," Tara said quietly. "It's just that…"

Scully shook her head, finally sitting down across from them to dry herself in front of the fire.

"My life…" she began, not knowing for a moment how to continue, "is strange," she finished, rather lamely. Maggie raised her eyes from the baby to give her a piercing look. "It's strange and it's painful and it's hard to explain. I'm sorry you got dragged into it."

Now both women stared at her.

"Dana…" Maggie began weakly.

"No, mom, you have to admit it," Scully shook her head, "you don't hear a lot of stories about women who didn't know they had children. It's usually the other way around. You probably still think I imagined it."

Maggie and Tara exchanged guilty looks.

"Look," Scully said, "genes don't lie. That girl was my biological daughter. There probably are more, but I don't think I'll ever find them." She lowered her head, exhausted now.

"What makes you so sure?" Maggie asked softly.

"They took all my ova, mom," Scully said to her knees. "They took it when I was missing and they've been using it ever since. Mulder knew about it, apparently at some point he found out. He just didn't see fit to tell me until now."

"Dana," Maggie said softly, "you were very ill until recently, and I'm sure Fox would've told you if you were…"

"It wasn't his secret to keep," Scully cut her, wildly. "It's _my_ life, _my_ children they stole. Not his."

"No?" was all Maggie asked, and for once Scully was speechless.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"You and Fox," Maggie said quietly, "you're more than just friends, aren't you?"

"Yes," Scully said before she could think it over, "but not in the way you think."

"No?" Maggie asked again, in the same quiet tone. Tara looked curious.

 _She'll probably tell Bill all about it tomorrow_. _Great_.

"No," Scully insisted. "It's not like that."

"Then what is it like?" Maggie asked softly.

What _was_ it like?

"We're partners," Scully said. "We understand each other. We care about each other, yes, but we are not a couple."

"Why not?" Tara asked now, to Scully's surprise. "Bill thinks you are."

Scully shook her head. "You can tell him that we're not, okay? And that it's none of his damn business."

Tara smiled, briefly.

"Fox loves you," Maggie said, almost too quiet to hear.

Scully sighed.

"Mom, don't take it the wrong way, but it's none of your business either."

"I just want to see my daughter happy," Maggie said.

Scully shook her head. "I doubt Mulder can make me happy," she said to no one in particular. "He has a lot of baggage to sort through. And so do I," she admitted, still not looking at them.

"How long do you think that would take?" Maggie asked and Scully grimaced. She was _not_ going to grace that with an answer. She wished people would stop trying to force her into a mold and just let her be. Her mother, Mulder, Bill, they all wanted her to behave a certain way, to make them feel more at ease. Meanwhile, she had just buried a child she never knew she had. All she wanted was a good cry, _not_ to think of her complicated relationship with an infuriating man. She fastened the cross necklace around her neck.

"Do you think it would be okay if I took a bath?" She asked Tara.

"Yes, of course," Tara said. "You don't have to ask, Dana."

Scully nodded and went upstairs. She shut herself in the bathroom, turned on the water and finally gave in to tears. They came in waves, mourning Mulder's betrayal and Emily's stolen body and her painful life. She cried and cried until there were no more tears, until she was so tired that all she could do was crawl into bed and fall asleep at once.

At night she had a dream about blowing away like sand, broken and all alone. She had a dream where Melissa came and held her close for a long time. She saw a little girl in the distance, it could have been Emily but she wasn't sure. She dreamt about alien babies and blinding white lights. Finally she dreamt about Mulder, sitting in a crappy motel bed and crying his eyes out, while outside the rain washed the world clean.

In the morning, when he came to pick her up, his eyes were red and raw. She reached out gently and touched his cheek, the puffy bags under his eyes. He gave her a courageous little smile and shrugged.

"You better let me drive," she said and he nodded. Her family watched mutely from the porch as they switched places and drove off. Mulder sat with his eyes on her the entire ride, but she never took hers off the road.


	12. From the Ashes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mulder and Scully standing together in the burnt remains of their office.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remeber that scene at the end of "The End" where Mulder is looking around the destroyed office while Scully is holding him in the weirdest way? That's when this story takes place.

Of all the significant moments he had in this office, only a few came to mind now, as he was standing in the ashes of his life's work, hardly aware of her presence before him (the pressure of her cheek against his chest, her hands on his arms). Only later did it occur to him that he should have hugged her – right now that was the last thing on his mind. But his mind _was_ full of her, since almost every significant moment he had in here involved her. Every object in the office, even the most trivial, was somehow connected with her.

Here, for example, was the desk where he sat with his back to her when she came in for the first time. He heard her heels clicking a mile away and still did not turn, his every move calculated. He wanted to give her the impression that she is not important, that he will not let her ruin him, that she will not get anything on him.

_What an idiot._

He did notice her eyes, though - large, bright, filled with intelligence - the same eyes he will see over the years losing their innocence but never their blaze.

And there, that's the slide projector – no need to elaborate. One too many photos of dead cows if you ask him, not that anyone did. And the remains of a single desk (the truth is, he did not see her as a fully separate entity; their intimacy was such that he viewed her as an extension of himself. Subconsciously he felt that getting her a desk was as useless as getting one for his left leg).

And here was the poster: "I want to believe". This should not have anything to do with her. It was already there when she arrived. And yet, she managed to make even that her own: "you are here", she wrote one day on a small yellow post-it and placed it straight over the flying saucer in the poster. She was smiling slightly when she did this, and giggled as he threw a pencil at her. But he never bothered to take it off and besides, she had a point.

And at that burnt bit below the poster, there used to be a photograph of the two of them. It was taken during an investigation: both standing close, peering at a case file, him holding a page for her to read. He didn't know who took that picture but he liked it so he put it on the wall.

And back there, where everything seemed to be beyond salvage - one file cabinet holding 932 files. Or rather, used to hold them. He knows them all by heart, but will soon forget the details. His sister's file was in there, and Scully's; Scully again, even there.

And here was Scully, standing before him, clutching his arms for dear life. He did not hold her back – was afraid to. He imagined that they will be separated again, that she will be taken again. He could not stand the idea of not having her around, or even the idea of working with her in one of those horrible open-spaces they had upstairs. The office was his cocoon, and hers. Without it, they were terribly bare.

*

She held on to him, trying to comfort and draw comfort at the same time, but it was like hugging a statue; a wall. She heard his heartbeat and felt his chest go up and down in shallow breaths, smelled his sweat and the smoke of the office. It was scorching hot in there but she was cold, cold to the bone.

She, too, was thinking about him, about the comfort he needed and what she could give. That’s what she always did. The loss of the office affected her differently than it did him. She didn't feel the pain in the same way that he did. It wasn't _her_ office, never had been. It was always his: one name on the door, one desk inside (okay, so there were four desks in there, but none of them was hers). In five years she left very little impression on the office. If someone was to wander in from outside, they could not have guessed she occupied it at all.

Was it also a choice? Probably. She could have gotten her own desk years ago, but chose not to. Was this why Mulder still treated the X files as _his_ , not _theirs_? Was he secretly afraid she was just temporary there, that she could still leave at any time? Or was it the other way around? Was she afraid that if she put her name on the door it would mean she is actually there, that this really is her career, her life?

She was all over the walls, in her own subtle way. The newspaper clipping from Duane Barry's case used to hang up there, for example, right next to Tooms'. Every day she came into work having to look at the faces of her abductor and her attacker, but she never complained about it to Mulder; never mentioned it to him. She wanted him to think of her as strong, so she never let him see how much it upset her.

There was also a picture of the two of them, peering at an X-file together. Skinner took it at one point and gave it to her. She long suspected that Skinner sees them as a couple, so she thanked him and showed it to Mulder, who smiled and hung it on the wall above his head.

The ceiling was full of pencils he threw up there whenever she was gone, unwilling to admit that he missed her. The cabinets were full of his little vintage instruments, all destroyed now. The files were gone too.

_Everything we've accomplished, all gone._

She looked up at him, carefully. He was still looking around, lost. She reached up and pulled him into her arms and he finally relented, falling into her hug and wrapping his arms around her. They stood like this for a long time, he crying into her shoulder and she stroking his hair, until the lights of the police outside were gone and they were left alone in the darkness.


	13. Whispers in the Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While on a case, Mulder and Scully are forced to share a motel room. Zero touching ensues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, "The Rain King". Crazy weather, a town full of shippers and yet another dead cow (what is it with The X Files and dead cows?!). Anyway, this particular cow falls through the ceiling of Mulder's motel room, trashing it and forcing him to move to Scully's room, where they spend two nights. This is the story of those two nights.

"So…how do we do this?"

Scully lifted her head from the report she was working on.

"Do what?" she asked. Her voice was somewhat absent, probably because her mind was still on the report. Her eyes were slightly unfocused and her hair messy. Mulder smiled.

"Sleeping arrangements," he explained.

"Oh." Immediately, she was all there. "Hmm," she added for good measure, looking around. The room was decidedly devoid of any usable sleeping spaces, other than the bed.

"I can sleep on the couch," Mulder suggested quickly. She raised her eyebrow at him, then lowered her eyes and chuckled, seemingly to herself. It was something she used to do all the time until she was abducted. She didn't smile that much, after that. The small gesture came back recently, which made him ridiculously happy.

"What's so funny?"

"Nothing, nothing," she said, "It's just…I pictured you trying to sleep on that tiny love seat."

He looked at the small sofa, trying to imagine himself squeezing into it while Scully spreads her tiny limbs on the huge bed. Chivalry be damned, he was not doing that.

"Yeah, you're probably right."

"Look," she said, blushing ever so slightly, "it's a king size bed. We're adults, we can handle it."

"Can we?" he wiggled his eyebrows at her, gaining an immediate severe look.

"Unless you want to try the love seat after all," she added frostily.

"No! No, that won't be necessary, no," he said hastily.

"Good," she said, smiling to herself, and turned her attention back to her computer. "Now I need to finish this, if you don't mind."

He nodded mutely, silently berating himself. It was true that Scully and him have been pushing the definition of 'professional relationship' for years now, but still…in the last few months they did come to a sort of _understanding_. Though they never mentioned that near-kiss in the hallway, nor the fact that he told her he loved her, things became easier between them. It was not a straight line, they had their ups and downs, but it seemed like they were heading in some sort of a romantic direction. Still, he should probably not have tested Scully's boundaries quite so much.

Since she was not looking at him, he went to brush his teeth and change. When he came out of the bathroom she was still smiling to herself, for some reason. He settled in on the bed and turned on the TV. A slight hum of dissatisfaction was all the reaction he got, before she sank into her report again. He started flipping through the channels absently, not even noticing what he was seeing.

"Just…no porn, okay?" she asked without lifting her gaze.

"Don't worry, I'll be a good boy," he promised.

No reaction.

After an hour or so she closed her computer with a slam and went to the bathroom, emerging washed and dressed in the eternal pajama suit. He never thought pajama suits could be sexy, until he met Scully. She was barefoot, her hair wet and wavy. Without makeup she looked younger, somehow, her pale face full of freckles and her eyes huge.

"What?" she asked when she noticed his gaze.

"Nothing," he said, but he couldn't help the smile. "It's just that…you look like you did that night in Oregon."

"What night? Oh!" she said, getting into bed, " _that_ night."

She didn't look as embarrassed as she should have.

"Give me that," she took the remote and turned the TV off, laying her head on the pillow with a satisfied sigh. "You must have thought I was trying to seduce you."

He was caught a little off guard. It took him a moment to understand what she said. Her eyes, when he dared to look, were sparkling with amusement.

"No, I didn't, actually," he said. "I could see you were really scared."

She turned off the light on her side, so he followed suit. In the moonlight her lips were dark pink, their corners curved in the way that always made him think of kisses.

"What did you think of me?" she asked softly.

He smiled, remembering her in a similar moonlight, all those years ago.

"I thought you were…delicate," he said, without thinking about it.

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know, just…small and…pretty," he was squirming now, glad for the darkness.

"You thought I was pretty?" she sounded genuinely surprised.

"Well, yeah," he admitted. "Come on, it's not like you didn't know."

"I didn't," she insisted. "You never said anything."

"Of course not," he said, indignant, "I wanted to keep working with you."

She didn't answer. For a while she was quiet, and he thought she fell asleep.

"How do you think he does it?" Scully asked suddenly, startling him.

"Who?"

"Holman. How does he control the weather?"

"I don't know. I'm not sure he knows. He has…strong feelings, I guess."

"Strong _suppressed_ feelings," she added.

"Yes," he conceded.

"Lucky neither of us has that ability," she mumbled sleepily.

"Yeah, right?" he sniggered. He imagined the FBI building struck by lightning every time he managed to make Scully smile.

She didn't answer. He turned around to see her fast asleep. He smiled to himself, removed a strand of hair from her forehead, and closed his eyes.

*

The next night they settled into bed without discussions.

"We fly out first thing in the morning," she said. She was lying on her side, facing him, not touching. They were both warm and relaxed, but touching was probably a bad idea.

"Good," he said, "this town gives me the creeps."

"It does, doesn't it?" she agreed, smiling. "It seems that all they think about is romantic relationships. It's like this whole town is stuck in high-school."

Mulder smiled. "Holman couldn't believe that we weren't involved."

"Sheila, too," Scully said, "or anybody else."

"People don't understand," he said.

"Well, I can't blame them," Scully replied. " _I_ don't understand it, half the time."

"What do you mean?"

"Well…look at us," Scully said. "Right now, for example."

"Yes?"

"Here we are, sharing a room, sharing a _bed_ , and we're as comfortable as two ten year old girls on a sleep-over."

"Hey!" Mulder protested. " _Ten year old girls_?"

She sighed. "You know what I mean."

He nodded, while still giving her a look. She chuckled.

"So, we're at ease together," he said. "Is that bad?"

"No," she hurried to say. "It's just…sometimes it's strange, that's all."

"Strange how?" he pressed.

"It's just that…it was _always_ so relaxed with you, right from the start, right from that night in Oregon. I was so comfortable it made me uneasy. Did you know I had a boyfriend at the time?"

"You did?" he asked, surprised.

"Yes, I did. We broke up shortly after I joined the X-files. "

"You never mentioned him."

"We weren't that close back then. You and I, I mean."

He considered this. "It's hard to imagine now," he said, "a time when we weren't close."

She didn't answer, but smiled in the moonlight.

"What did you think of me?" he hazarded to ask, "that night, in Oregon?"

"I thought you were sweet," she said. "I thought I could trust you. I wanted you to trust me."

"I did," he said. "Right away, I did."

"I know," she sounded sleepy now. "I'm grateful."

"For what?"

"For you," she said simply. "That you trusted me, let me into your life. I know how hard that is for you."

"Do you think they're right?" he asked, on impulse.

"Who's right?"

"This town. The people. Do they see something we don't?"

"No," she answered. "They see something that is _there_. I'm just not sure they interpret it correctly."

"What do you mean?"

"We _are_ very close, Mulder. You know it, I know it, everybody knows it. It's just that not everything is about romance, and not everything is about…sex."

"Isn't it?"

"Well…"

He blushed, despite himself.

"Are you sure it's something we should be discussing…right now?" he asked, uncomfortable.

"Probably not," she agreed.

"Why aren't you embarrassed?" Mulder demanded.

"I don't know. This town is probably getting to me," she said sleepily. "Plus, I have nothing to be embarrassed about, Mulder. You know my heart."

"I'll…see you in the morning," he said lamely, and she actually laughed. If he had Holman's powers, the whole sky would've caught fire right then.

"Good night, Mulder," she said softly, smiling at him.

"Good night, Scully."

"Sleep for once, okay?"

"You too."

"I will," she said and immediately fell asleep. For once he did too, and didn't wake up until morning. By then she was already dressed and pressed and ready to go. The woman from the previous night was just a memory, but when they made their way to the airport the air was light between them. As usual, they talked about everything but what's important and as usual, it didn't matter.

On the small plane, when turbulence hit, she held on to the seat for dear life. Without much thought he took her hand in his. She squeezed it, thankful, and kept it in hers even after the turbulence passed and they were floating through clear, blue sky.


	14. Hips Before Hands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Several months of Scully dancing around her feelings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so this one's a little different. Season 6 just had too many moments I wanted to write about...so I did. This chapter is composed of several short stories, which happen (in order) in "Tithonus" (final scene), "Arcadia" (Mulder and Scully on the couch), "Milagro" (post episode), "The Unnatural" (baseball scene) and "Field Trip" (ambulance ride at the end of the episode). Enjoy!  
> Oh, and some adult content. Nothing graphic, though.

Mulder reached out for her the second he entered the room, and her hand lifted up to join his without a second thought. It was good to connect with him like this; all the tension seeped away, as if their physical connection put them both at balance.

Maybe that's it, she thought. We balance each other out. She found it hard to be at ease by herself, her thoughts running around, crushing into each other, tumbling. With Mulder she could organize her mind much more easily, breathe deeper. Think.

He was telling her that she was making a remarkable recovery and she told him she didn't know how she thought that this man, Fellig, was really immortal. But there was a gnawing doubt inside her, one which she dared not share with him: what if he _was_? What if he took her turn and now she can never die? Will she end up like that, desperate and all alone? Will she, too, forget Mulder's name, his smell, the shape of his lips?

Her abdomen still hurt where the bullet hit, but it was getting better. The bullet went straight through her and stuck in the wall. Fellig's autopsy showed nothing abnormal about him, he seemed like a healthy man of sixty-five. Since he had no one, Mulder made arrangements for his burial. He was sweet that way. Scully thought she'd tell him that, but never found the right time.

*

Mulder and Scully were sitting on the couch in Gogolac's house in Arcadia. Mulder was wrapped around her to an embarrassing degree, as close as he could without her actually sitting in his lap. It should have made her more uncomfortable than it did.

Ever since they set foot in the town Mulder was all over her, hugging and touching and squeezing; under normal circumstances, such behavior with a female agent would send him straight to HR. These were not normal circumstances. It wasn't just the case, as they were required to be close to pass as a reliable married couple; no, it was not that. She had a feeling Mulder was finally _free_ , that he always wanted to be like this with her, to hug her and touch her all the time. He was always too physical with her for a colleague. She never complained, because she wasn't bothered by it. But this…this was too much.

She made sure to send him to the living room at night, even though they already shared a bed, and quite professionally, in Kansas. But this was different. She didn't trust him here, or herself, for that matter. She hid her face behind a green witch's mask and her body in a bathrobe, as self-defense. They had been through too much, have gotten too close lately, to be really comfortable with this mission. But she was enjoying herself. She had to admit at least that.

They were sitting on the couch, way too close, when Scully realized she has been petting his arm absentmindedly for quite some time. His skin was smooth and the hair on his arm was soft. He smelled good, scrubbed and clean. Domesticity suited him. Who knew? She drew her hand away, embarrassed. Mulder said nothing, but tightened his grip around her.

*

She woke up from death to find Mulder leaning over her, his eyes full of worry and pain. She stifled a scream, remembering the agony of having her chest torn open, her heart ripped out. She grasped Mulder like a drowning woman and started to cry. He held her as tight as he could, blood staining his sweater, as she sobbed and sobbed.

When she finally calmed down he insisted on taking her to the hospital, where they found nothing wrong. She didn't want to be alone so Mulder took her to her apartment, drew her bath and tucked her in bed. He even kissed her forehead softly and she was about to protest, but didn't. These last few days have been confusing as it was.

Mulder left the room and settled down in the living room. She heard him turn on the TV and knew he'll stay up all night to watch over her. She lay in bed for a long time, listening to the sounds he was making, drawing comfort from his presence.

Her thoughts wandered to Padgett. He was creepy, no doubt, but he also made her curious. Why was that? Why was she always attracted to crazy, crazy men? And then she remembered: Padgett said she was in love. She forgot about that. Mulder said nothing about it but his face, when she dared look at him, were young and open with wonder. She didn't want to crush him, but she was more annoyed at Padgett than anything else. Who did he think he is? As if what he wrote about her wasn't bad enough. Well, what did _he_ know?

She was definitely _not_ in love. She would have known, wouldn't she? So what if she sometimes found Mulder's smell overwhelming, what if she delighted in making him smile? She was attracted to him, that was never a secret. But in love? _Naaah_. The last time she was in love did not end well for anyone involved. She barely made it out of that relationship alive and Daniel harassed her on the phone for months after she left. She doesn't fall in love anymore, a matter of choice. She didn't love Ethan and she didn't really love Jack. And she doesn't love Mulder. Well, okay, of course she _loves_ Mulder, but she isn't _in love_ with him.

 _Right_?

_Right._

Scully sighed. Finally giving up on sleep, she got out of bed and shuffled to the living room. Mulder lifted his gaze up to her with a worried expression.

"Can't sleep?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"Scooch," she said and sat down beside him. "What are you watching?"

"The Planet of the Apes," he said, "but it's already halfway through."

"That's ok, I know it by heart," she said. "It's one of my favorite movies."

"I know," he said and finally smiled at her.

*

Mulder wrapped his arms around her, his hands framing hers on the baseball bat. She was overwhelmed by all the smells: wet grass, fresh dirt, Mulder. Her knees went weak. Here was another funny thing that kept happening lately: she was ridiculously happy to be near him. He cracked jokes and held her close. He made her laugh. She couldn't help but flirt, it was out of her control. They hit the baseball again and again, and it all felt a little surreal, like a dream: the boy that seemed to have escaped the 40s, Mulder's baseball shirt, the stars. She was happy.

Maybe that's what was missing between them, for such a long time. Mulder made her feel safe and thrilled and exasperated and annoyed, warm and protective and rebellious and loved; but he rarely made her feel _happy_ , until very lately. Maybe he finally took to heart the things that Holman told him, or Padgett. Maybe he was trying extra hard because he knew how unnerved she was by Diana Fowley. Maybe he _did_ love her, like he claimed. Maybe she _did_ love him, like Padgett implied. All it took was five minutes of seeing them together, she idly thought. Right now she couldn't concentrate on that. She was happy. She was light. She was playing baseball.

After the hour was over Mulder walked her to her car. She thanked him for the birthday gift and he leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. She blushed like a teenager and he smiled, tipped his imaginary hat and walked away. At home her underwear was soaked through and she had to touch herself to relieve the tension. It’s been such a long time and her body sang with gratitude. She was so ready that all it took was to picture Mulder's face in front of her, imagine it were his long fingers touching her; she was swept by a long wave of orgasm, so intense she gasped out loud. Afterwards she was hot and blushed and embarrassed, but also content. _Mulder_ , she thought to herself as she fell asleep, and couldn't help the smile from forming on her lips.

*

He held his hand out to her and she held out hers, without even needing to look in his direction. She knew where his hand was in the same way she knew her own; they were still connected by whatever it was that mushroom did to them. It was comforting to be linked with him like this, to be inside his head and to let him inside hers.

Her skin burned where the digestive juices dug into it, but she hardly felt that. Mulder's hand was warm and soft, steadying her. She focused on it to ground herself in reality, since the hallucination swallowed her every time she closed her eyes.

"Are we saved?" Mulder asked, sitting comfortably on his couch. It looked real. It _smelled_ real. She pinched herself to make sure she was dreaming. It felt real.

"Yes," Scully said, even though she was not so sure. "This is just the residual effect of the hallucinogen. It will wear off eventually."

"Are you sure?" he asked and she nodded.

"Open your eyes," she said and he did, she could feel it. "Do you see? I'm right there with you."

"You're here," he said, and she nodded. "How?"

"I don't know," she admitted. "Maybe this mushroom somehow has the ability to transfer information between your neurons and mine, something in the digestive fluid that enhances our sensitivity to…"

"Really?" he cut her off, "a telepathy mushroom?"

"Do you have a better theory?" she asked, defensive now.

"No," he shook his head, smiling, "for once I don't. It'll have to be studied, though."

"They're probably burning it to a crisp right now," she said.

"Do you think so?" he asked, disheartened.

"That's what usually happens, isn't it?" she asked. "We find something extraordinary, something that could revolutionize the world, only to have it yanked away from us at the very last second."

"Does that upset you?" he asked, his voice soft.

"Of course it does. Doesn't it upset you?" she asked, confused. It was him who was usually desperate to prove the truth, after all.

"Not this time," he said, smiling bashfully. "To be honest, this time I'm just glad we both got out of it alive."

She looked at him, quiet. She wondered just how much of her thoughts he can see, how much of what she's been through today he's aware of. She spent her day in a nightmare version of a world, where everybody believed her theories but her; where Mulder was dead and she was treated as his widow. She would have been, too, even though they never even kissed. It felt like the floor was dropped from under her feet and she had nothing to stop an endless fall.

"I'm so glad you didn't die, Mulder," she said, on impulse; or maybe it was just her thoughts, running away from her. For once he said nothing, but his eyes flashed with unmistakable emotion: love and admiration and hope.

His hand squeezed hers and she opened her eyes, back in the ambulance. She finally turned her head to face him and found him already looking at her, the same shining look in his eyes. She closed hers, the usual way to conceal her feelings, only to find him sitting in front of her in his pretend living room. There was no escaping this time, no hiding from him. There was nothing to do but return his smile and finish the ride to the hospital in silence.


End file.
